The report says that 26-year-old Vlaar has pulled out of the £3.2million move having had talks last week at Villa but not hearing anything since.

The defender said:

"The chance that I will now sign for Aston Villa is almost zero. I don`t like to be messed about. You can write down that this transfer is now off."

John explains that he is rated at £8million but there is a £3.2m release clause. Seems strange doesn`t it?

Feyenoord managing director Eric Gudde has also said the deal is off adding the way Vlaar has been treated is 'not very good`.

Ouch. All seems very strange. Without any inside knowledge, looks a bit clumsy doesn`t it? It might be, for some reason, that Paul Lambert decided against the move, but then, why invite him over and show him around?

Comments

0

If there is a 3.2 million quid release clause, it seems odd we wouldn't have gone in for him. It also seems odd that this chap has gone from bigging-up his dream move to calling time because we messed him about, and all in the space of a few days. It also seems odd PL showed him around if he wasn't interested, and it's all a bit odd that PL would've made any promises knowing he was off to the US for a week and a half. So, in my opinion, it's all a bit odd really. Odd, odd, odd.

It is of course possible that PL decided against signing the player and Vlaar is simply trying to save face by appearing to pull out. It's also equally possble that the player's repesentatives were told that nothing would happen until after we return from the US but that the message didn't get through or the player is too dumb to understand.

In these days of telephone calls, video link ups etc think it's quite strange to cart a guy all the way from Amsterdam to Birmingham for "a chat". Why are we no geting anything from Villa on this subject? Is it that the PR department etc are all in the US?

next...lol, Sack the board sack the manager what we gonna do now? Sorry couldn't resist that whatever the reason and there are a few its up to Lambet who he wants to sign for Villa and be part of his team not Feyenoornot Vlaar or us so lets just wait and see who Lambert actually sign rather than who wants to sign for us i say ;)

People seem to hear what they want to hear and believe what they want to believe ............. Paul Lambert TWICE said before he went to the USA that no deals would be done while the team were out there ! How much clearer could he be ? how many times does the manager need to say it ? Vlaar's agent also spoke to Swansea as reported in the press, so it seems they are desperate to seal a big pay check and Feyenoord desperate for our 'plentiful' cash as they themselves put it. The only people who look bad in this are Feyenoord and Vlaar's agent, if the deal fails, it will be their fault not Lamberts. UTV

For 'chat' read 'interview'. A player might be useful on the pitch but disruptive off it. It's a sterotype of course, but Dutch players in particular are often considered to be, ahem, 'single minded'. Paul Lambert might have wanted to look into the eyes of a player he was asking his employers to shell out millions for. Maybe, he didn't like what he saw? The rules of recruitment in football are, surely, not that different to any other line of work. Strangely, this episode enhances PL and the club in my eyes, rather than diminishing either. All just speculation, though.

Surely it is common courtesy to inform the player and the team you are trying to buy him off of your intentions, whether that's "we want to think about it" or "we are interested but we need to sort out a couple of things before we can go ahead, which may have to wait till we get back from pre-season tour" We had this same issue with OGS so we are getting a bit of a bad reputation for messing people about - if we are not interested then we should come out and say so!

griff - how on earth did we mess OGS or his club around? We asked him to be part of a process, he said yes and his club agreed. Their shareholders then got vocal and OGS changed his mind. As for Vlaar how do you know that he or his people haven't been told exactly what is hapening ? Why are you so quick to believe the player and assume the worst aout the club?